We had another good night sleep being well sheltered in this lagoon. Despite the overcast weather we had our usual morning swim just before breakfast. Then while B worked in the galley and did some boatkeeping, I had a few repair jobs to do this morning, then we looked at our options for the rest of the day. Another boat came into our little lagoon, closer enough to say bonjour and went anchored at the other side of the lagoon. We thought after lunch we would go in the dinghy to explore our surroundings but the weather had a different plan for us.
The rain settled in as we had lunch. Then it hit. It only took minutes for the wind to get up to over 40knts (80km per hour).
That stretched the chain out putting us close to the reef. Too close. So B took the helm and I ventured out to the bow. B had to drive into the wind while I hauled anchor. It was not easy to control Imagine as she has so much windage at the front of the boat. That ‘s probably when one of the adjustable solar panels was blown by the wind and flipped over breaking the hinge to end on deck. We managed to move forward enough to drop 45m of chain with a swing room keeping us just off the reef.
The wind was blowing the rain so much it was stinging me. The rain was so heavy that we lost sight of the boat anchored in front of us. If they dragged anchor we wouldn’t see them until they were a couple of metres away. We stood at the helm for 2 hours checking we were not dragging and checking where the other boat was. We caught glimpses of it as the rain eased for a few seconds.
As the rain eased and the wind dropped to 27knts we could relax a little. B made us a cup of tea and we had a little debrief trying to relax after that very tense situation. What a welcome to Wallis!
there is a boat there somewhere 
our track on anchor
